The Growing Bond
by thatRandomGrl
Summary: The young Dick Grayson has been out on only a few missions so far with the Vigilante himself. but what happens when he misinterprets a few things said about his night with the batman? (One Shot)


**The Growing Bond**

The Batman and his young sidekick, Robin has just arrived back at the Bat Cave where Alfred was waiting for them after a long night of Crime fighting. Just as the door to the Bat Mobile opened, out popped a small boy doing flips in the air out of pure joy. He landed gracefully on his feet into a stance the Batman himself had taught him.

"WOW! That was SO cool, huh Batman? First you were like BAM! And then Penguin went BOOM with his umbrella, but you scooted out of the way and took him out! Oh! And wasn't it cool how I took out those thugs?" the young boy reenacted everything as he took off is mask. Hiding under the mask revealed the face of the young Dick Grayson as he showed his pride.

Batman took off his cowl revealing his own face to the small boy. He grinned as he watched the small child continuing his back flips and shown off his new moves he had learned. Alfred carefully watched as the boy quickly threw punches into the air and produced no handed cartwheels.

"Master Dick," Alfred said in the politest way he could, "Would you kindly stop punching the air?"

Dick laughed as he finished his last flip and handed Alfred his costume. The boy then turned around and leaped into the air and grabbed hold of the slender pipe dangling from the cave. He swung around a few times and potentially glided to the top of the stairs of the Bat Cave. He looked back taking a bow as he would back at the circus and ran into the mansion.

"Now I know why he was called a 'Flying Grayson'…" Alfred said as he took Bruce's cape and cowl. Alfred walked away with Bruce as they went upstairs into the main part of the house. They went their separate ways as Alfred went to put their costumes into the laundry basket and Bruce went to prepare for a shower.

Bruce took off his clothes revealing welts and bruises all over his muscular, toned body. Bruce looked at them determining if they would need to be treated. As he studied his injuries, Alfred knocked on the door and walking in with a warm, clean towel and some shower products. Alfred looked at Bruce's injuries in worry.

"Good heavens, Master Bruce! Were you run over by a truck?" Alfred asked, expressing his concern.

"Before Dick was able to get to the thugs, they beat me down." Bruce said to his faithful butler as he turned on the water for his shower.

"Would you need anything, then sir?" Alfred asked.

"No, just…tend to the boy." Bruce requested as he began to take off the rest of his garments and step into the steaming stream of water.

Alfred walked out of the master bathroom to find Dick peaking his head out of the door. Tears began to form in the young boys eyes as Alfred realized how much he had heard. The boy ran down the hall and out the door with a bag in his hand, seemingly to hold his costume. Alfred ran after him as the boy sprinted down the drive way and into the city.

"MASTER DICK!" Alfred called after him. But it was no use. The young child had just ran out of their lives and into the streets of Gotham. Bruce came running out where Alfred was standing on the front porch.

"Alfred! What's wrong?" Bruce asked alarmingly. He was only in a bath robe with water dripping down his back from his wet, jet black hair.

Alfred only looked at Bruce with a scared expression which had made Bruce's thoughts run about the dangers of the city that could happen to the small boy.

"I'm so sorry, Sir!" Alfred apologized. Bruce only ignored him and picked up his suit, ready to put it back on again. The thoughts on where the small boy would be headed ran through Bruce's mind. Then he realized the one place the small boy felt at home: Haly's Circus.

"Where do you plan on going, sir?" Alfred asked, worried for Dick's life.

"There's only one other place Dick probably felt at home." Was all Bruce had said.

"Well, you better hurry along then, Master Bruce. The Train for Haly's Circus leaves in ten minutes." Alfred informed. The masked billionaire ran to the Bat Mobile and zoomed out of the Bat Cave, not waiting for anything else. As he sped down the streets of Gotham, he tried his best looking on top of the roofs to try to find the Boy Wonder on one of them.

With no source of Dick on the roof tops, Batman finally made it to the lot where the Circus was held to find the lot empty with not a soul within the location. Batman hopped out of the Bat Mobile just to make sure. He took out his Night Vision goggles to help him see better. Panning slowly over the land, Batman spotted a small figure sitting down in the distance. Batman sprinted over to the figure and stopped about 20 feet away from it. From there, he could hear the quiet sobs coming from the figure.

"It was all my fault!" the boy said as the tears trickled down his face and onto the cold, concrete ground. Batman slowly walked towards the boy getting ready to try to comfort him. The boy turned completely around facing the opposite direction of his guardian. Batman crouched down next to the small boy and put his hand on his shoulder.

"It was ALL my fault, Batman!" he repeated again. "If only I had told my parents what I heard and saw the guy do. They would still be here, and I wouldn't be here to mess everything up for you!" Robin sobbed.

"No." Batman tried to comfort him, "none of it was your fault. Believe me, I felt the same way towards the person who killed my parents." He whispered. Dick looked up at him with tears running down his cheeks. Batman then said to the young boy what he was told by his own father.

"Why do we fall?" Batman asked the young boy. Dick stared at him and shrugged his shoulders. "So we could learn to pick ourselves back up." Batman smiled at the child. The child then wrapped his arms around vigilante and hugged him. Bruce looked at the boy for a second in surprise, as he was barely hugged by children. He awkwardly put his arms around the child and gently squeezed him back. "Batman?" Robin asked as he pulled away from the hug, "Why did you…want me to become like you?" the small boy asked.

"I don't want you to become like me. I encouraged you to help me so you WOULN'T become what I am." Batman told the boy. The boy wonder smiled at him. There was silence as they watched the sun peak from the Gotham Bay.

"Why did you run away?" Bruce finally asked the young boy. The boy didn't look at his guardian but only stared out into the horizon.

"Because I didn't get to you on time…you got…hurt. I heard you talking about it back at the house." The boy replied, his voice shaking from the recent tears he shed.

"I didn't get hurt that bad." Batman tried to reassure.

"But Alfred said it looked like you got ran over by a truck." Robin retorted.

"But he failed to realize that without you by my side, this mission would have been much harder to complete." Batman congratulated. Robin's face grew bright. "And I want to thank you for helping me." Bruce smiled. This time, Batman put his arm around the boy. The child gladly accepted and leaned up against his partner.

"And because you were such a great partner," Bruce added, "Would you like to help me out again tomorrow night?" The boy's face filled up with as much joy as he had before. The boy hopped to his feet into a ready-to-fight stance.

"You bet!" he said with a grin. Batman stood up and smiled at the small boy that back flipped his way to the Bat mobile and hopped in. Batman let out a small chuckle at the boy's energy. He then got into the seat next to the boy and rode off back home ready to get into his own bed as the morning sun rose.


End file.
